Taiwan Summer 2013: 蘭花 (orchids!)

Orchids are so beautiful. Period. I was amazed at how many different species and types there were! We went to King Car Orchid Park today for a guided tour and lunch. This company makes coffee, whisky, and orchids?! Such a weird combination, but it works! It was so neat to walk around their greenhouses and look at their progress. It was interesting to notice that some orchids actually like the cooler temperatures (I felt it as we walked into a cooler greenhouse), which was surprising because I thought that orchids liked only tropical warm weather. But it turns out, there are some species that are specifically bred to withstand the cooler temps, mainly for customers who like to put these orchids in their air-conditioned workspaces and offices. We had lunch at a offsite café that this company owns. It was so cute, with the Victorian architecture exterior. We got to try their famous coffee! (mine was iced-coffee!) I think a lot of people didn't like the taste as much, because it was very strong, but I drank every last drop; the needed caffeine for the busy busy day/week.

We did a lot of driving and sitting in the bus today, which was actually nice to chat with some people and catch up on some much needed sleep. But we made some cool pit stops along the way! Our first one was just to stretch our legs, and of course take some more pictures. It was a bridge that went over a busy harbor. It was really really windy though! I was laughing too much at Baker, who brought his umbrella with him. The umbrella was crumbling underneath the harsh wind, almost enough to snap the wires. Also, it would invert as a huge gust of wind swept under.. I don't know why I thought it was so funny. Maybe lack of sleep.

Our bus took a windy road that was on the very edge of the cliffs that had the whole Pacific Ocean in our left windows. We were all on the edge of our seats to try and see the ocean and amazingly steep cliffs that seemed to just drop straight into the water. But another stop of ours was at Cingshui Cliff beach area. We made our way down the trail to the water front. The sand was grey/blackish! Many rocks matched with the rocky cliff landscape. We took many jumping pictures and some didn't move away from the waves, so some of us went back to the bus wet.